


Stalemate

by caramelaire



Category: She-Ra and the Princesses of Power (2018)
Genre: 800 words of self-indulgent hurt, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst and Tragedy, Don't Read This, F/M, Hurt No Comfort, Implied/Referenced Character Death
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-11
Updated: 2020-10-11
Packaged: 2021-03-07 23:21:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 793
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26945866
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caramelaire/pseuds/caramelaire
Summary: Bow and Adora arrive too late at Horde Prime's ship.
Relationships: Bow/Glimmer (She-Ra)
Comments: 8
Kudos: 37





	Stalemate

**Author's Note:**

> Look at that, I wrote something below 1k words! So this is just me hitting the self-destruct button and an attempt to get out of my writing funk. I also love chess metaphors and just... metaphors in general.

Bow didn’t know what they expected when they arrived at the Velvet Glove, but it was certainly not this. 

In all of his life, he had never even considered it as a possibility. When it came to her, he was slowly realizing that there seemed to be a lot of things he should’ve considered but didn’t.

It was just that... in the past few months, something more urgent would always beg for his attention and so he could do nothing but bury all of it in a pit inside his head. Out of sight, out of mind. Tacked on with a flimsy caution tape that told his consciousness to back away from it. Added a note that said ‘for later.’

His chest would feel weird and fluttery around her, and he’d merely raise his eyebrow and shove the feeling in the backburner to ponder upon for later. 

His heart clenched painfully when they argued or when she began to keep things from him, and he’d set it aside to make sense of for later.

He was furious about everything wrong that occurred between them, in their friendship and in… in some other things… and he’d let the realization gather dust on the shelves of his head as he made saving her his priority—more so than eating or sleeping or breathing sometimes, it seems.

Always thinking that there was a later.

Later, after the war. Later, when they’ve rescued her. Later, when things have settled down. He never considered otherwise until it came at him like a painful slap in the face that made his entire universe spin. 

There is always one instance in time, a moment in everybody’s life where everything that is everything to a person changes. Their reality altered so drastically that the dissonance threatens their sanity—trapping them in a standstill with the world as it all unravels before them. 

And it’s not always a pleasant realization. 

“Welcome, She Ra,” Horde Prime’s menacing voice veiled in a pretence of hospitality greeted them after they failed to sneak around the alien ship, unable to find Glimmer. It was clear now why. “I’m afraid you’re already too late—”

 _Too late_. 

Like if he was underwater, senses dulled, Bow hears his own heartbeat and the string of words resound to him with no meaning. He had structured every waking moment of his life in his head with her somewhere near him—like if she was the world and he was the sun. Except, defying all sense of logic, as he always did when it came to her, he was the one who revolved around her. But then she had strayed too far from his gravity, or maybe he did. Either way, it didn’t matter now because, in the end, the light of his warmth had still ceased to touch her any longer. 

She Ra wails in grief beside him. 

Horde Prime circles the open white casket presented like a dinner table for their eyes to feast on. Flowers were surrounding her still soft pink hair. The most peaceful Bow has seen her in a long time since her mother died; the same peace he had only imagined seeing again when she’s finally back in his arms.

Not this way, though. He has never imagined it this way.

Two Gods face each other; one who saves and one who kills. And in between, he’s standing there, a mere mortal man. 

Men, who have always been infamous for taking after their Gods.

“Such a shame her majesty took after her beloved She Ra and just had to play the hero,” Horde Prime snarls, words dripping from his lips like poison. “No Queen, no balance for the Heart of Etheria. That was her plan it seems, and now everything is ruined. Truly a pity.”

Bow read once in his dads’ books how black holes in space were surrounded by walls of fire before even light itself is sucked into it. He didn’t know how much of that was true, but as the ringing in his ears ceased and Horde Prime’s words echoed clearly into the black void, he felt his insides ignite.

When the sun burns, it staves off the darkness. 

But when it burns too much, it dies; and when it has finally had enough, it explodes into an abyss that consumes everything around it. 

With one fluid stroke of his bow, an unwavering gaze at the monster before him, and a mind and heart that both, at the same time, crumbled and steeled itself for the worst of what’s yet to come, Bow took after the other God with no hesitation.

One arrow straight through the heart. That’s what it felt like when he saw the love of his life lying there, lifeless.


End file.
